


A Quarter to Apocalypse

by L_Belacqua



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-05-18 21:38:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19343149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/L_Belacqua/pseuds/L_Belacqua
Summary: Crowley didn't want the world to end, that's where he had parked the car!Aziraphale didn't want the world to end, that's where he met Crowley.On how the second apocalypse was avoided despite the ineffable plan.And who is this God person anyway?





	1. Aziraphale

**Author's Note:**

> I've written this fic with both the book and the show in mind, trying to make it appealing to both readers and viewers. So you should find some book or show-only trivia, but it’s not going to be confusing if you only know one medium.

Inside a small Soho restaurant an angel and a demon were arguing about free will. 

 “But if it’s all part of a plan, ineffable or not,” started Crowley, pouring himself wine again, “then there is no real free will, since all is written in advance.” 

“The plan… well the plan could be to let people have free will,” said Aziraphale. All his attention was focused on the woman three tables away from them. He had a miracle to perform and he had asked Crowley to help him on this one. The demon accepted but did not really seem to care about it, as usual, he was mostly there for the wine and the food. 

Three tables from them a young woman was eating with her friends. Well, she was not  _that_  young anymore; it’s hard to be young at 25 when all your colleagues are 21. Tomorrow was her big break, she was going to propose a new project to her boss. It had taken her months to come up with it: celebrities naked on an island singing karaoke songs. It was genius. She was ecstatic. She had taken her presentation to show her old university friends. All were in advertising. One recently scored a contract to make the jingle for scented lint roller.  

“But it doesn’t matter cause it’s ineffable.” 

“To be frank,” said Crowley, as he was sinking into his chair, “I don’t buy the ineffable argument.” 

“Sorry?” exclaimed Aziraphale, snapping back from is concentration. 

“It helped us get away with trying to stop Armageddon’t,” replied Crowley, “so I went with it, but no, I’m not convinced” 

The truth was that the demon had been convinced in the beginning, but it scared him. Living in a world with some all mighty entity toying with you, and being blind to his will was more than he could take. He may be a demon, but he was not immune to existential crisis.  So he decided that it must have been otherwise, and had stuck with the notion since. 

“Sometimes I even think that there is no plan at all. Just because there’s a design doesn’t mean that it’s intelligent,” he said. “And I’m the demon responsible for tramp stamp tattoos, so I speak from experience!”  

“But why do the celebrities have to be naked,” asked her friend. “It doesn’t add anything more to the show.” She was in fact jealous. Her own pitch “kids battle inside a giant ball pit” was discarded weeks ago. Stupid Child Protection Services. 

“It does! Cause the name is ‘Naked butt not afraid’.” 

They were served desserts. As usual, once Aziraphale finished, he started to help himself to Crowley’s one. The demon never seemed to care. It was quite strange to steal that easily from a demon. But this time he had something more in mind.  

“I don’t get why you’re still performing blessings, the second apocalypse is coming.” 

“Because I’m an angel, that’s what I do.”  

 “You’re an out of service angel.” 

“Still, my nature doesn’t change. It’s still who I am.” A movement at the other table caught his eyes. ”It’s the moment, dear.” 

At the other table, the woman had just put her presentation back in her briefcase, the same model has Crowley had brought. He snapped his fingers and the two were exchanged. 

“I don’t get why you can’t do it.” 

“It’s a curse, not a blessing.” 

The woman stood up to say goodbye to her friends. They did the same, Aziraphale blessed the table so the note was paid and Crowley picked up the wine bottle they didn’t finish. Outside, as the angel was getting in the Bentley, the demon snapped his fingers. The heels of the woman's shoes broke. She cursed and limped to the tube. 

“Why did you do that?” 

“So we have more time, angel.” 

The Bentley rolled into the London streets furiously. Aziraphale looked ahead, terrified. 

“Can you stop drinking while you drive?” 

“You said we were going to drink.” 

“Yes, after we perform the blessing.” 

Aziraphale started to regret asking him to help. He had an idea for a TV show that would replace reality TV. A nice one, to make people happy. 

Reality TV was actually a Crowley invention. He took the inspiration after reading a copy of  ‘No Exit’ he had borrowed from the angel. He had found it hilarious, even if he did have a few critiques. 

"Hell is not the ‘Other’. Mind you, I’ve been through hell. it’s quite pleasant once you’ve accommodated to the screams.” 

Aziraphale stopped giving him books after that. 

   
 

They arrived at the girl’s flat. They shrank to pass through the atoms under the door. Then Crowley opened it and took the wine bottle he had left behind. 

The flat was everything a young Londoner could dream of. It was big enough to have a bed in it and mornings could be made really easy by the fact that the shower was in the kitchen. It had vinyl stickers that you can find in cheap deco TV shows and too many different shower gels in the sink. 

Crowley approached the computer on the unkempt bed and, just like that, the thing broke. Aziraphale found an older one, with university and children’s stickers on it, inside an overstuffed  closet. He turned it on. 

“What kind of food should I put in the fridge?” shouted Crowley. 

“Cake mostly, dear.” 

“You’re the expert here, I’ll let you miracle that.” 

“What does that mean?” 

“That you’re always eating my slice of cake, so you must be more knowledgeable on it.” 

“Well if you don’t want me to do it, why don't you say so?” 

“I don’t want you to stop. I’m a demon, and as such, I never deviate people from temptation, angel.” 

They heard a noise in the hallway. She had been faster than they thought.  They shrank through the atoms and exited the flat. 

She entered her apartment quite drunk and threw her shoes into the shoes corner. It wasn't really a dedicated corner, but since she threw all her shoes there, it now was. She fell onto her bed, her briefcase still in hand. She could have done with a cigarette. She opened the briefcase to retrieve one. It was empty. She closed it. She opened it again. Still empty. She started panicking. She turned to her laptop. The light of the blue screen illuminated her face. She panicked more. All of her work was gone. 

She sat on the bed, fresh drops of sweat on her back waking her up. She had lost all of her presentation for tomorrow. Her life was over, the whole world was ending. She was going to be fired and end up working in internet advertisement, where people didn’t even have a desk and the happiness manager spied on you to make sure you smiled at work.  

As always in troubling times, she turned to her fridge. She didn’t recall having stocked it with cakes, but she wasn't in a state of mind to question it. She sat on the floor eating and first had a cry. Then she started to pick herself up. She still had her old university laptop. She could write the presentation again. She took it with still cake in hand. She didn’t remember having that photo on screen saver. It was her and her high school friends, on a sunny day in her grandma's garden. One of them had come up with the idea to bake a cake for their last day of school. They ended up having a big food fight.  

A wave of nostalgia hit her hard. She wasn’t thinking about “Naked butt not afraid” at that moment. She was thinking of the sun, the smell of sugar and cut grass. Then she thought she had an idea. Well, she did indeed have one, but she mistakenly attributed it to herself and not the angel, currently sitting in an old Soho bookshop.  

  

 

“I don’t get how people are going to watch a baking show in a sunny garden where everyone is nice to each other,” said Crowley, as he rested drunkenly on a couch in the back of the shop. “Besides, when doesn’t it rain in this country?” 

He had put his left arm on his eyes, a movement that lifted his shirt. Aziraphale stared at him, like an animal would stare at fire. Even if he had encountered the demon in his original snake form the first time they met, he had known him in his human form longer. His body was all sharp angles, bones and muscle. Was he really beautiful, or just in the eyes of Aziraphale? No, he must have appeared beautiful to others has well; after all, the demon was made for temptation.   

 He was even charged with tempting young virgins at one point. It didn’t go well, as he stated himself to the angel, “Virgins are boring, and I don’t get how it’s bad for them to have sex. If you want my opinion, pushing abstinence and fear of desire make people way more miserable!” So he ended up seducing no one, and tutoring hell on shaming desire. And it had worked really well ever since. 

A scholar once asked, “Do Angels feel desire?” He, indeed, was the creepy one in the monastery and not very well liked by his fellow monks, who were studying more important and serious questions like:  

\- “Did Adam have a belly button?” (Yes, but on his back. God wasn’t really sure of where to put it yet back then.) 

 or  

\- “How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?”  (One, and only the gavotte).   

 Angels, indeed, feel desire. It had happened before, but it was a long time ago, and for a human woman, not a male-shaped snakish demon. Oh, God was angry after that. He flushed away almost everyone. Or was that part of the ineffable plan? Aziraphale wondered. 

“You’re going to fall asleep, aren’t you?” 

“Maybe. You should try it, angel. You’re really missing out on that one.”  

 “No thank you, dear. Besides, I don’t know how to do it.”  

“Really?” Crowley took his arm off his yellow eyes and lifted himself up into a sitting position.   “Come, I’ll show you.” 

He gripped the angel’s right arm and pulled it. Shocked, and having no idea on how to respond, Aziraphale let himself be dragged onto the couch next to Crowley. They were only a few inches apart, not an atom of one touching the other. The demon crossed his arms on his chest, closed his eyes and let his head lean forward. 

“We have stopped the Apocalypse in order to continue our decadent, hedonistic existence,” he muttered. “So you should make the most of it as long as it lasts.” 

Their relationship since Armageddon was not totally changed but not the same either. It was mostly due to Aziraphale. When he was still on heaven’s side he indeed saw Crowley as his friend, but the wall between them was clear in his mind. He had a sense of duty. A sense that good and bad were separate entities. Now the wall had cracked. 

“Why do you even bother doing those stupid miracles? Do I do cursings myself? Yes. But only out of selfishness and boredom.” 

“I think,” Aziraphale took a deep breath, as he was going to dive into deep water. “I miss when I was working for heaven and had a plan to follow.”  

Crowley opened his eyes. “You what?”  

 “It was reassuring! I didn’t always agree with what they did, of course,” the angel said defensively. “But, I reassured myself every time that I had acted for the greater good. And if something appeared, well, not that holy at all, I shrugged it off with an: ‘the end justifies the means’. It was not mine to understand. But now, I understand. I understand that there was never a ‘greater good’ and I miss the assurance that came with it so much.”  

“Oh angel,” said Crowley, suddenly worried about his friend. He put a hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder. A wave of both pleasure and discomfort hit them, and he took off his hand promptly. He crossed his arms back on his chest. “Let some time pass, and you’ll see. It will grow lighter on you and soon enough, you wouldn’t trade it for the world.”   

He was thinking about his own fall. It had been a blessing, retrospectively. 

“And it’s not like you’ve always obeyed them,” he added, referring to a certain lost sword. 

“No, but I mostly followed the path. And what I did was always with good intentions.” 

“Which is what we use in hell as cobblestones.” (The road to hell is, as stated previously, paved with frozen door to door salesman, but the inside has got cobblestones, yes.)  

 As Crowley closed his eyes again Aziraphale gazed at him. Sometimes his friend could be really nice to him, even if he was literally a demon. He asked himself if demons could love, as he, an angel, could. After all, Crowley was right in stating that Adam, an own son of Satan, was not determined by birth to do evil. Satan was an angel before, as Crowley had been.   

Something in him tore apart, a part of the fence cracked, an unprecedented possibility hit him. 

At this precise moment the demon opened his eyes and looked at him angrily, his shoulder blades twitching against the couch. “How can you sit on that for more than a few minutes?” He grumbled, ‘It’s so bloody hard.” 

And, just like that, the gate closed its doors. How could he have let himself entertain such an idea? Years of repression hit him. He felt resentment, for himself, for Crowley, and then anger, an unusual feeling for him, a desire to hurt back.  

“You’re bony, that’s why you don’t find it comfortable!” He immediately regretted saying that. “If you want, I've got a pillow in the other room, dear,” he added, to soften the blow. 

Crowley didn’t seem to take offence. He actually didn’t seem to care about anything at all at this moment. He closed his eyes again.  

 Aziraphale spent a few horrible minutes drowning in his own embarrassment. Then, without uncrossing his arms, Crowley let his head slowly and delicately fall on Aziraphale’s shoulder. 

 “I’m not bony, it’s you who’s comfortable,” he muttered, pretty unintelligently. 

And Aziraphale felt what someone who is leaning at the top of a very sharp edge must feel.  

  

 

Inside an old English cottage, which was, very uninspiredly, named Shangri-La, a retired harlot and an ex witch finder were preparing for their wedding ceremony.  

The cottage was the one rented by Anathema and Newt previously, but we will come back to them later. For the moment the new old couple were planning who to invite.  

“We should invite that nice entity who possessed me,” said Madame Tracy. “After all, he is part of the reason we ended up together. And he’s so sweet.” 

“Ye southern pansy?”  

“Yes dear, you said you know where he lives.”  

Shadwell was not enjoying the idea. After all, he had tried to kill him and, for all he understood, nearly succeeded. It would be pretty strange to have someone like that at your own wedding. But, he guessed, the angel must have forgiven him, as you can’t hold onto that much resentment for someone you fought Lucifer with.  

“Well I guess we should extend the invite to his boyfriend, the one with the sensitive eyes.” 

“Ha ye woman, but tha two pansy better behave.”  

“And since we’re on people we met at the air base, we should also invite that nice, tall gentleman.” 

“Ye tall nice gentlemen?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've tried to imitate the way Shadwell speak in the book, which is quite hard since it's more of an unique accent I'm not familiar with.


	2. Crowley

Hyde Park’s ducks must have been the most informed birds in the country. They were, for example, the first creatures on Earth to know that the Apocalypse was coming.  And they were also the first creatures to know it was going to happen again. They just didn't care. Unlike Crowley.  

He had woken up on Aziraphale’s couch, alone, with the vague memory of a physical touch and the fading sensation of having liked it. It was the angel who had awakened him, they had to go to Hyde Park to finish his miracle. Crowley had followed him because it was easier to do than staying with his thoughts.  

Crowley was anxious, he knew something was going to happen. But he didn’t know what. Of course no one could have noticed it, seeing him so laid back on a bench with his sunglasses.  

The least likely to notice was a young woman with a briefcase. She had spent the night in a manic state, she was walking on clouds, she had the greatest TV show ever written in her bag. She was going to be the envy of all her friends, particularly Nancy, with her job at the head of the kids channel and her Facebook photos of expensive vacations.  She was so lost inside her own dream of victory that she almost ran into two KGB and MI5 agents feeding a swan.  She saw her boss a few feet away, near a group of teens playing cards. 

“Dear,” nudged Aziraphale, and Crowley, snapping his fingers, set off the sprinklers next to the group. 

The water took them, and a Chinese spy arguing with a Japanese one, by surprise. They looked around for another spot to continue their discussions.  

Aziraphale snapped his fingers and a ray of sunshine hit a group who were having a picnic a few feet away.  

The two woman sat next to them. 

The demon looked at his friend gazing  smile at the two women sitting on the grass. A light radiated from Aziraphale. Crowley had never thought angels were nice. Most of them were just entitled, rigorous weirdos. But not Aziraphale. He of course hated his ridiculous way of dressing, his timidity, his awkwardness. And what he most hated was the fact that he liked him for that. 

Do demons feel lust? At that question the scholars unanimously respond, "Yes of course, they are demons! Who are you? What are you doing in my house?" 

But none of them ever asked themselves if they also feel love. They in fact did, previously being angels; they were simply not very well informed on it. 

Crowley had been a creature of love for, like a week, before his fall. He had just attended the training about “how to not let your wings caught in trees”, and fell just before the one on “how it’s not ‘better to reign in Hell, than to serve in Heaven’.” He definitely missed the one on love.   

 There was some love story between demons in hell, but we are not here to tell such horrendous tales. 

“Did you know,” said Aziraphale, snapping Crowley out of his meditative state, “Shadwell is going to marry the woman I had possessed during the Apocalypse?” 

Crowley took some time to proceed the information. 

“Don’t they rent the cottage where bicycle girl and her useless boyfriend used to live?” 

“I wouldn’t have put it like that, but yes, they do. In fact, we are invited to the wedding, she called me earlier.” 

“We?” 

 “Well, she said ‘for you and your gentleman friend with eye troubles’.”  

Crowley nodded. Quite typical, he thought. “I can’t go,” he stated, “It’s a sacred ceremony, with some holy thingy. Not safe for me.” 

“Don’t worry dear, it will be a non-religious one. “ 

“Oh. Why do they marry if it’s not religious?” 

“For the taxes.” 

“Good point,” he conceded. “Well, I’m bored, but not that much.” 

“You should find yourself a hobby, Crowley,” said Aziraphale playfully. “You’re going to need one now that you’re an ‘unemployed demon’. And drunk sleeping on my couch isn’t one. ” 

At the mention of the couch he remembered last night in a flash. 

“I slept on you didn’t I?” 

“Oh dear,” the angel blushed and turned himself away from Crowley. “Yes you did, you were quite drunk. And that’s why you should try to do something with yourself.” 

"Yes, I’m going to learn knitting,” the demon said cynically. “And you? What are you going to do with the rest of your time? Since you’re also an ‘unemployed angel’." 

"Well,” he paused. “I've a book shop to run, that takes some time." 

"Come on! It's never open and you don't even really sell books.'' He stared at Aziraphale a long moment. “Angel, don't you want to take a walk on the wild sssside?" 

The angel sighed. "That's not me, Crowley." 

"Don’t you want it, sometimes?" 

"I may be an unemployed angel, but I’m still an angel. I can’t do that, dear." 

"Yes but, do you want it?" 

Aziraphale looked at him with an air of envy, then retracted it, as he always did. But then he added, “I may sometimes entertain that idea, yes.”  

Crowley lifted his eyebrows, surprised. Something must have changed in the angel, he would never have been this direct before. He felt a sort of warmth. 

"What are you bringing all that up for?" he asked. 

"Maybe I'm stressed. We stopped the apocalypse once, we may not succeed next time." He reflected a moment. "I feel what humans must feel, knowing their time on Earth is limited. I don’t want to miss the things I like the most.” 

"That changes your perspective, yes. Humans do weird things when they feel death approaching, buying cars, having retirement plans," he paused. "Marrying." 

“I can’t believe Shadwell invited you. He tried to kill you! As far has an old fool can kill an angel.” 

“Well, It’s actually the bride who invited me. We shared a body once. Oh Crowley,” started Aziraphale, excited. ”I’ve never been to a wedding before! There’s going to be cake, music, love everywhere…” 

Crowley looked at the angel, unfazed. He was not at all interested by this wedding nonsense, but he liked the obvious joy in Aziraphale.  

“They’re going to have the ceremony in the cottage. Newt is going to be the best man, Anathema is going to be a bridesmaid, I know Adam is going to bring the rings." 

Something clicked in the demon’s mind. 

“Adam!” 

“Yes, he must be twelve by now. I know his friends are also going to participate. I never remember their names, it’s like it’s always Them in my mind…” 

“Adam! We should seek Adam!” exclaimed Crowley. 

“What for, dear?” 

“Adam could stop Hell and Heaven when they figure out how to start the fight again. He’s done it once, he could do it again. We should help him. 

“And why should he need us?” 

“He’s just a human kid, he doesn’t know Heaven and Hell like we do. He doesn't even know the fight is not over. He must be running around clueless, doing what other kids are doing like…playing with sticks or yelling in close spaces.” 

Crowley, as Aziraphale for that matter, never was a child, so he spoke from what he understood their daily activities were. 

“So you are going to come?” 

“Yes, to stop the second apocalypse!”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had quite an hard time figuring what kind of Crowley I would write. The one in the book his more of an hedonistic optimist, in the show he is more anxious, more pessimistic. I guess I'm more leaning to the show portrait of him here.


	3. Adam

The Them weren’t impressed by this marriage thing. They had woods to explore, adventures to attend, and they couldn’t do it inside the cottage. They actually could go outside into the garden, but Adam had to stay here until the ceremony with those stupid rings. And what was the point of being outside without Adam? 

From Adam’s point of view married people were boring people, living boring lives. Like his parents or other adults. James Bond never married, that’s why he lived an adventurous life. His pirate detective could never live a life of adventures if he was married to princess Pretzel Hair! Proof of that, Shadwell was marrying cause he abandoned his life as a Witchfinder. Adam would never do such a thing.  

“What do people even marry for?” he asked angrily. 

“To have babies,” responded Brian. He was taking this philosophically, since he was going to have cake at the end of it. “They give you one a few months after the wedding. I think they give you a form to fill at the end of the ceremony.” 

“Of course not!” exclaimed Wensleydale, “Pepper’s mum wasn’t married to her father.” 

They all turned to look at Pepper who was staring angrily at nothing. 

“Why am I obliged to wear this dress!” she shouted, noticing their gaze. She was indeed in a very fluffy pink dress. “Why can’t I wear a costume like you? It’s impractical! It’s patriarchal oppression!” 

“I would wear a dress if I could,” responded Brian. “It’s too damn hot today.” 

“Weddings are boring. Nothing happens,” complained Adam. 

“I’ve seen on TV that the priest is going to ask ‘if someone is opposed to this union may he speak now or shut up forever’ before declaring them married,” explained Brian. “Then someone stands an’ says “I do” and the groom has to fight him with a sword. If he loses then the bride is kidnapped. That’s why there’s a best man. To help the groom fight the kidnapper.” 

If it was on TV, it must be true, they thought. 

“Are we going to fight a kidnapper?” Pepper asked. 

That was more to Adam’s taste: Fighting a kidnapper! But who could kidnap Madame Shadwell? Must be an evil man. He reflected on who was the evilest man he knew. Mr Tyler, The Chairman of the Resident Association was always trying to kill all the fun they had. Complaining about him eating his apples, complaining about him crossing his garden, complaining about them having perfectly normal adventures in restricted areas. He must be the one who was going to kidnap Madame Shadwell. And then write a letter to the local paper, to complain about the lost art of wife kidnapping. 

“We should protect her,” Adam decided. “You three go outside and keep an eye on Mr Tyler, I know it’s going to be him. Pepper, you will be near the bride at the crucial moment, we’re counting on you in case the fight begins before we can reach them.” 

That was a thing Pepper was more inclined to do than just looking pretty. “But Adam, you’ll be alone.” 

“That’s all right,” he said. “I’m going to watch them build the photo booth from the window.” 

 

With a screeching sound, the Bentley arrived at the cottage. 

Crowley exited the Bentley with elegance. He wore a deep blue tuxedo with what seemed like leather shoes, if they really were shoes. Aziraphale was wearing such an outdated tartan suit that it could pass as vintage if it was worn with a beard and a clean, shaved haircut. 

On the porch they saw Anathema. She was in some kind of fluffy pink dress speaking to a similarly dressed older woman. 

“Ladies,” she said, visibly happy to change the subject of the conversation. “Let me introduce you to Aziraphale and Crowley, I met them while biking in the neighborhood. Gentlemen, this is Miss Hudson and Miss Elsie, old…colleagues… of Madame Tracy.”  

“Oh,” said Miss Hudson, turning to Aziraphale. “I’ve got a couple like you in the flat I rent out.” 

“Oh dear,” he exclaimed. “It’s not like that. He’s actually a demon.” 

“They all are, aren’t they?” 

Crowley was not at all interested and turned to Anathema, “Why aren’t you renting this cottage anymore?” 

“The owner wanted to sell, apparently renters are too much trouble. We didn’t have the money to buy it, so we rent a small flat near here.” 

She didn’t tell him about her trouble finding work. She had trained all of her life for the apocalypse and didn’t really think about what she would do after. She didn’t have any marketable skills. She tried to reach out to her relatives who were made rich by Agnes’s prophecies. They were indeed very pleased to still be alive, thank you, but didn’t plan on sharing any of their fortune with her. After all, Agnes’s prophecies were for them, not her. If she had intended to make Anathema rich, she would have prophesied it, wouldn’t she? Anathema didn’t explain that maybe she  _had_  and that she had just burned the prophecy book that could have shown that. 

She tried to conduct séances with Miss Tracy. It didn’t go well. The older woman was terrified to learn that Anathema could channel real spirits. “People don’t really want to hear spirits, after all they didn’t speak with them when they were alive. They just want some wishy-washy feel-good sentences. No dear, this won’t do.” 

They looked at the middle of the garden where Newt and an older man were trying to put together some kind of cabin. 

They heard a big CLONK. 

“OK, that’s the second wall that’s fallen,” said Newt. 

Useless boy, thought Crowley. “Why is he wearing some cheap period drama movie costume?” 

“Oh, it’s his Witchfinder’s costume.” 

Newt also had some trouble finding work, his accounting degree being useless since he couldn’t use a computer. 

 

The Them had first looked for Mr Tyler, but he was nowhere to be found. Bored, they then searched for anyone who looked suspect. There was this older man with some strange costume, but after further inspection they realized he was the groom. Their search was fruitless. The only thing they found was chips, which Brian had then taken from the kitchen. 

“Maybe he’s not at the wedding yet,” reasoned Brian. “And he’s going to come back on a horse in the middle of it. It’s quite typical actually.” 

“I think I’m seeing someone who could do,” said Wensleydale. “He’s wearing some kind of robe.” He pointed to a tall adult. As they looked at him a strange sensation came over them. It was like something they should be afraid of but weren’t. They were kids, the world was new, and they were eternal. So, they didn’t feel fear but were fascinated by this adult. 

 

Crowley searched for Adam. His eyes were caught by a very tall silhouette. So tall in fact that he didn’t seem human. He had the sensation of having encountered this person before. He approached, curious to hear the children talking excitedly with the stranger. 

 **YES, I’VE SEEN IT DONE WITH A BAZOOKA .**  

Crowley stopped. It was Death! 

Madame Tracy was not the brightest crayon in the box, she had seen that tall, nice gentleman, who was nice to Adam during the failed apocalypse, and wanted to invite him. She didn’t have his address, or his name. But Death was everywhere and heard her wish. He had never been invited to a wedding, not once in 6000 years. Oh, he had attended some, but you couldn’t say he was welcomed. The incongruity of the invite caught him by surprise, so he attended. 

He was munching something, surrounded by the Them, minus Adam. They were eagerly asking him questions. 

“Have you ever killed a dinosaur?” 

**DINOSAURS NEVER EXISTED. IT’S JUST A JOKE.**

“Have you ever killed someone with two heads?” 

**YES .**

“And with three?” 

A big CLONK once again. 

“Don’t worry, it’s just the second wall again,” shouted Newt. 

**YES .**

“And with three heads and three arms but two legs?” 

“We should take our seats, dear.” Aziraphale had just arrived behind Crowley. “The ceremony is about to begin.” 

“Aziraphale, there is Death! Literally Death Himself here.” 

“Yes, I saw that. I would be astonished as well if this wedding didn’t already include an Angel, a Demon and the Antichrist.” 

 

The guests started to take their seats. Then, half of them noticed they were at the wrong seat and changed. It took some time. 

Pepper was waiting near the hotel with Anathema and the two other maids of honor. 

“Why must I wear this dress? And this whole marriage thing is revolting. It’s a patriarchal relic of male dominance. I refuse to be some property with a man’s name on it.” 

“Darling,” said Miss Hudson, “you will see once you grow up that you can make men be YOUR property if you want, with the right skills of course.” 

Pepper looked at Madame Hudson, horrified. 

As Aziraphale had stated, the ceremony was not conducted by a priest, but by a local official. 

It was actually Mr Tyler, the old Chairman of the Resident’s Association. He had finally acceded to his life’s dream of being a true official, with his own page in the local paper to complain. To be frank, no one wanted the job, but no one wanted to give it to him either. He was elected on the 5th time he tried, and only because no one else bothered to run. A much better year than the one he had lost to a duck that some punk had enrolled in the election. 

Shadwell was waiting near the hotel. He was wearing his Witchfinder’s costume. Unlike Newt, who looked like an extra in a cheap historical drama, Shadwell looked like a true time traveler, one who would have spent his nights sleeping under a bridge in Victorian London. 

Madame Tracy, soon to be Madame Shadwell, arrived. She was wearing a long pink dress. White would have been really too much. 

“We are all united today to celebrate the union of Madame Tracy and Mister Shadwell.” 

Crowley was anxious, where was Adam? 

Adam appeared. In his hands was a small red pillow with the two rings. He concentrated. At any moment now someone would turn up to kidnap the bride. He looked at Mr Tyler suspiciously. 

“Shadwell, Thomas Heinrich James, do you take this woman for your wife?” 

“Ye.” 

“Tracy, Josephine Dalida Drusilla, will you take this man for your husband?” 

“Yes.” 

Aziraphale was ecstatic. As an angel, feeling love gave him waves of warmth. He looked at Crowley; the demon was concentrating on Adam, as he didn’t want to miss him. 

“You may now kiss the bride.” 

Everybody stood to applaud, making Crowley lose eye contact with Adam. “Oh, for Hell’s sake!” 

 

They were near the buffet, both with a plate of cake in their hands. Aziraphale finished his own slice and started eating Crowley’s as the demon was nervously searching for Adam. 

“Come on dear, have some rest, it’s not the end of the world is it? Well not yet at least.” 

“The entire world might end soon, sorry to not be in the mood to enjoy cake.” 

“Well, at least you would have enjoyed yourself before that. You should try some, Crowley, it’s delicious.” 

Crowley stopped his search and looked amusedly at the angel. 

“The last button on your waistcoat is working really hard right now, you know,” he said. 

“Very nice,” replied Aziraphale, vexed. “Sorry for buying my own clothes and not cursing some to fit me perfectly like you.” 

“Come on…” Crowley started. Why did the angel never understand that Crowley teased him about what he liked about him? But then his eyes caught Adam. He was with the Them, near Death. 

 

Adam had been bored by this wedding. There were no kidnappings or sword fighting. At least he liked Death’s stories about the worst ways he had seen people dying. He was not really fazed by Death Himself being here. It was his first wedding, he didn’t know what kind of people normally attended. He was comfortably seated on the grass, listening to Death telling them about some French king and a pig, while eating chips on a plastic plate. 

“Hey, Antichrist!” 

He looked around and saw Crowley approaching him. He vaguely remembered having met him at the air base. Adam thought he looked like those boring old rock singers his father liked to blast in the car. 

“I’m the demon Crowley, we need to talk.” 

Adam didn’t respond and continued eating chips. He was not impressed at all. 

“Okay, you must be thinking, ‘great, the apocalypse is over,’ but no. I know Heaven and Hell, they are going to be at it again soon. We need you to stop them and we can help you.” 

“Yeah, no thanks,” Adam responded. “You guys always turn to me to solve your problems. I’m not interested, I’ve already got so much to do.” 

“How can you not be interested in saving the world? What do you think will happen to you if it ends? And what do you have that’s more important to do?” shouted Crowley. “You are literally sitting on the grass and munching chips!” 

Aziraphale arrived at that moment. 

“Why you don’t ask someone else?” responded Adam, still unbothered. 

“Like who?” asked the Angel. 

“I don’t know,” said the Antichrist. “Who’s in charge of Heaven and Hell?” 

“Well,” started Aziraphale, “For Hell it was Lucifer and you wished him away. As for Heaven, I guess it’s God. But he’s not going to stop the apocalypse…or maybe he wants us to stop it… in fact we don’t know what he wants.” 

“It’s ineffable,” said Crowley cynically. 

“That seems like a lame excuse from someone who can’t finish a story,” responded Adam. “ _Oh,_ _sorry my pirate spaceship story’s ending cannot be completed, it’s ineffable_.” 

“And what do you want us to do?” asked Crowley. “Just let Earth be destroyed?” 

“I don’t know. Why don’t you ask God what his plan is?” He turned to Aziraphale. “You’re an angel, you must know him.” 

“Well, not really. I can speak to him, like humans, but he doesn’t respond, like humans. He speaks with the voice of Metatron. Metatron is not really his voice, though. He’s more of a spokesperson, really. But I’ve never actually seen him. And I don’t think I know other angels who have. Besides Metatron, of course.” 

“Do you mean that it’s not God who actually runs Heaven?” asked Brian. He was quite annoyed at this interruption. Death had been talking about humans being killed by wild animals prior to that. Much more interesting. 

“Just because he is not micromanaging everything doesn’t mean he does not run it! Does the Prime Minister run the matters of Tadfield?” shouted Crowley, who was beginning to turn hysterical. “No, he delegates. It’s the same with God.” 

“So what makes you say that God is actually on Heaven’s side?” said Wensleydale. “I mean, you two don’t seem too different but you come from opposite sides.” 

“I bet he’s not on any side!” said Pepper. “If you think of it, the opposite of someone who makes a thing is not  _evil_ , it’s someone who destroys the thing.” 

“Why don’t you find someone who knows how to get him,” continued Wensleydale, “to ask him?” 

“No one knows! He’s God!” exploded Crowley, “One does not simply summon God!” 

**I ACTUALLY CAN.**

They turned to the tall figure. 

**I’M THE DESTRUCT ION  PRINCIPLE, I’M HIS ANTIPODE AS THE CREATION PRINCIPLE.  WE EXIST BECAUSE THE OTHER DOES. THAT’S QUITE EVIDENT ACTUALLY BUT PEOPLE NEVER THINK OF THAT. NO, THEY ALWAYS THINK ABOUT GOOD AND EVIL. THAT’S QUITE UPSETTING.**

Aziraphale and Crowley looked at him, terrified and shocked. 

“Yes,” said Adam. “Do that, so these two will let me finish my chips.” 

And 

Just like that 

There was a nice older gentleman, dressed in black, with a short white beard and white hair. He was wearing a scarf and a hat. He had on a pair of thin glasses. Something in him looked definitively English, even if you didn’t know what. 

God was here, as if he had always been in that precise place. A violent CLONK echoed once again. 

“Don’t worry,” said Newt. “It’s just the fourth wall that fell.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay everyone, I’ve just insulted the authors and blasphemed. But I think we’re alright if neither religious group nor the author ever find this fic.


	4. God

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (*Gaiman actually said that you should “give your characters what they need, not what they want.”) 

Newt was not really shocked by anything. A year ago, he had been the worst accountant in England. After that he had become a Witchfinder. Then he had found himself in the middle of the apocalypse, seen demons, angels and Death. Even more miraculous, he had found a girl who initiated sex in the first hour and was now his girlfriend without any effort on his part. 

So God? Yes, why not, after all. 

 

“Hi, Death.” 

 **HI GOD .**  

“This is quite a first for you, isn’t it?” 

 **YES, I EVEN HAD CHIPS.**  

“So what is all this for?” God asked. 

There was a moment of silence. 

 Through history, Scholars had asked: “What question would you ask God if you met him?” Some went for: “What is the meaning of life?” Others with: “Why did you permit evil?” 

But the first to ask a question directly to God in history was actually Brian. 

 “Who would win between a rhinoceros and a hippopotamus?” 

“The hippopotamus.” 

“Oh… Well thanks!” He started to take some chips from Death’s plastic plate. 

“I’m sorry to have bothered you…” started Aziraphale. 

God turned to the angel and the demon, who looked at him, distressed. 

“You know that I like watching you two? You’re always in such a place of agitation, but you end up helping bugger all in the end.” 

“Watch your profanity, dear,” said Miss Hudson who was looking at the scene with confusion. 

“I’m God, lady. I cannot be profane.” 

As usual with humans, if the ones near the spectacle were fascinated, the others didn’t seem to care at all at what was happening a few feet from them. They were still eating cake or dancing to some horrendous crooner’s songs. 

“…thanks, I guess,” continued the angel. “We are sorry to bother you but we think the second apocalypse is coming and we would like to know what are you planning to do about that. Well, we know it’s ineffable, but if we could have a glimpse…” 

“The plan was never ineffable,” said God. 

Corwley wanted to shout “I told you so!” but he restrained himself. He was really distressed to be near the entity he had once defied before becoming a demon. 

“The truth is that there is no plan at all.” 

The information took some time to hit Aziraphale. 

“I beg your pardon?” said the Angel. 

“Do you really think there ever was a plan?” God asked. He sat on a chair which was both not there a second before and always here. “Do you really think because I’ve created something that means I care? About Humans? About Hell and Heaven? I’m not saying I’m not interested in what happens, but caring? Have you even seen a kid with a terrarium? Do you think he cares about the wellbeing of the ants?” 

“So why did you create us after all?” asked Aziraphale. 

“Why would someone want to observe others?” asked God. 

Newt had an idea about that, but he was not going to say it in front of kids. 

“You can’t understand what being an all-powerful eternal being is. When eternity is the same as an instant for you, when all rules are the ones you make. Then you need some kind of hobby. I’ve made a game with really loose strings. Sometimes I pull one and see what happens. A hint of evil here, spray some good here, make them unrealizable without the other and look at the result. You could say I’m an engineer.” 

“So, you do play dice,” murmured Aziraphale. 

“No dear, I play the most complex game ever created and enjoy looking at the outcome. You put a drought here and watch a bloody revolution spread. You put a pacifist in the middle of it and watch him choose if he wants to die on the inside or the outside. You plant love and look at it spread. You plant beautiful flowers on the highest mountains and watch people struggle to take them. Sometimes I’m evil, I give people what they want, and sometimes I’m good and give them what they need (*).” 

 

Aziraphale sat on the grass, his head in his hands. His respiration became more and more harsh. He was losing his religion. 

“I always knew it,” said Crowley. He stood with an air of both disgust and wrath. “I remember before my fall how we had to follow your orders without any question. I remember those times. I remember feeling that you, in fact, did not love. You're just a power-hungry despot.” 

“You always were one of the less stupid ones, weren’t you?” said God, turning to the demon. “I liked how you didn’t follow Hell’s orders. Those idiots rebelled once then followed another leader, like they didn’t know how to act on their own. And before you ask, of course I was behind that rebellion. You were a true rebel until the end. I guess it’s because you actually have good in you.” 

The disgust in Crowley’s eyes burned behind his glasses. A dark aura came from him. The humans couldn’t see it but God and Adam looked at it with interest. 

“And what are you going to do, my boy?” asked God. “Kill me? Not only can you not, but I can vanish you as I want. Or make you suffer for eternity. Do you feel powerless yet? And as for the first question, yes, the apocalypse is coming. And I didn’t plan who would win. But it will be intense. I’m bored right now, I guess I’ve come to the end of this game, I need more thrills.” 

Aziraphale’s breathing was irregular. He concentrated on it. He had to count. One. He inhaled. His breath was the only thing that existed. Two. He exhaled. I’m Aziraphale, he thought. One. He inhaled. I’m an angel. Two. He felt a hand on his shoulder. He exhaled. He knew it was Crowley’s hand. I’m a being of love. One. He inhaled. I love Crowley. I love humans. I love things that are good. Two. He exhaled. There is no such things as evil as long as I have these things. One. He felt the gaze of Crowley on him. He inhaled. And I have these things right now. 

Then an idea, like a lazy bubble surfacing a calm ocean, popped into his mind. He raised his head from his hands. Looked up to God and stood up. 

“You’re alone,” he stated. 

“I’m God. I’m alone by definition, my child.” 

“And you are suffering,” he continued. 

God raised an eyebrow. For the first time in 6000 years someone was looking at him with compassion. Not asking it for himself, not some praying devotee thinking God was suffering because of his human action. No. Someone looked at him with compassion for what he was: an immortal all-powerful being, alone, with nothing more than what he could create to entertain him. 

“You are like someone who knows everything about partitions, the rules, the grammar of it, but has never heard of music. You try to find joy in composing a symphony, more and more complex, violent, but no joy can ever come until you feel it.” 

Crowley looked up at him and understood what he was doing. 

“Planning the garden is great, but enjoying it is better,” continued the angel. 

“What are you doing?” asked God, confused. 

“I’m tempting you,” said the angel, “I’m tempting you to come enjoy your own creation.” 

Crowley then remembered his own fall. Not the actual fall, but the ground just after. He remembered a list he had made as he was lying down, on the ground. 

“There’s food,” stated the angel. 

“And music,” said Crowley. 

“And woods to explore,” said Adam. 

“There’s sliding on wooden floors with you socks,” said Brian. 

“Punching someone and being punched,” said Pepper. 

“There’s rain in the summer.” 

“There’s the odor of the ground after that.” 

“There’s horrible puns to make, and laughing at people that hate you for it.” 

“There’s running to escape someone who’s mad that you stole their apples.”

“There’s feeling the wind in your hair in a fast car.” 

“There’s meeting someone and knowing immediately that you like him.” 

“There’s meeting someone, knowing immediately that you hate him and are going to make fun of it after with your friend.” 

“There’s going to bed with freshly washed sheets.” 

“There’s being alone on the street, in the morning, as the sun rises.” 

“There’s books, and movies, where you feel the love, hate and death of a million other lives.” 

“There’s looking at the sky and feeling small.” 

“There’s finding something you thought you had lost.” 

“There finding someone you thought you had lost.” 

“There’s sharing your food with someone and knowing they enjoy the same thing as you.” 

“Or stealing it from their plate, just for the sake of it.” 

“There’s alcohol. The taste of it.” 

“There’s the errands you run after drinking too much of it.” 

“Being hammered on someone else couch.” 

“The sense of touch.” 

“And friendship.” 

“And love.” 

“There’s discovering that your feelings are mutual.” 

The wall between them definitively broke. By instinct they took each other hands. A step was made that would never be reversed. 

“Understanding is not feeling,” finished Aziraphale. “You made me for loving all, as a duty, but I’ve only really felt it once on Earth.” 

God rested a long moment. Everything was silent. It was like the world was new again. He turned to Death. 

“What do you think of that, my old friend?” 

 **WELL THEY HAVE A POINT WITH FOOD. CHIPS ARE GREAT.**  

“Would you come with me?” 

**I WILL MY FRIEND.**

“What would you recommend as a place?” 

“Definitely here,” said Adam. “We have a lot of places to explore and really great apple trees.” 

“Fair enough.” 

And just like that, a cottage both appeared and had always been here. 

 

At that precise moment, in that precise garden, God stopped intervening in human destiny and started to just live. 

In heaven, Metatron immediately felt something different. He was always on a constant channel, like an always ON radio. And, suddenly, there was nothing. He panicked. 

He descended one floor, searching for Michael. He found him looking at some memos. His beautiful face turned to Metatron, worried by his expression. 

“Michael, I think we’ve lost God!” 


	5. Metatron

They drove back in a deep silence, one not even broken by Freddy Mercury. They knew something had changed and they didn’t know how to handle it. Crowley stopped in front of Aziraphale’s bookshop. Something was about to happen.

Aziraphale  took Crowley’s glasses off. With care he poised them on the dashboard. He looked at Crowley’s  snakish  eyes. He had made up his mind. As the apocalypse inexorably approached, as there was no more God to appease, as there was now only one side, their side, he thought, “To Hell with it.” He advanced his head and Crowley met him the rest of the way.

They had never kissed anyone. At first it was just their lips pressing against each other’s. Then Crowley’s serpentine tongue slipped between his lips to enter  Aziraphale’s  mouth. By reflex the angel opened his jaw and the demon did the same. They had both no idea what they were doing. They were just here; in this instant, nothing existed. The world faded; had it ever had existed? The shared breaths were the whole universe, there was no time, no space. 

Something violently punched Crowley and pressed him against the car door. They both opened their eyes.  Aziraphale  had unfurled his wings. They filled up the whole of the Bentley’s interior.

 “Why the Hell did you do that?” he shouted.

“I don’t know!” said the angel, embarrassed, “It was like they opened up of their own will. Didn’t you feel the same thing?”

Crowley had to admit to himself that he had felt some tingling in his wings too.

“Oh, for hell sake…” He cursed the Bentley and the inside became as large as a limousine. To the drunken Soho crowd exiting night clubs and bars it looked the same.

“Did you hurt your wings?” he askedAziraphale. 

“No,” said the angel, stretching them. “I think I’m good.”

They stared at each other in silence. Nothing had really changed between them and all was different. They both knew, without speaking, that they were now a joint entity. 

Aziraphale  smiled. “Dear,” he said, “Do you think, you know, you and I, it’s, like, we're ineffable?”

“I swear,angel, I will walk 500 miles and walk 500 more just to be the demon who walked a thousand miles to slap you and your stupid jokes!”

Michael was quite destabilized at first. But he shrugged it off. It must be a mistake, they were Heaven, of course God was on their side, the good side. Metatron must have stepped on some internal button. He actually was quite annoyed, with the Armageddon they had had to reform a lot of departments.

Like a lot of beautiful beings, who naturally emit an aura of charisma, Michael never had any self-doubt. God created him to be an archangel, it was the only thing he had ever known. He had only ever come across others treating him assuperior. And that made him very dangerous.

Michael was indeed handsome, in the most conventional way one can be. He had recently taken a liking to human clothes and, contrary to  Aziraphale , actually knew how to dress himself. Contrary to Crowley he also knew how to use clothes to look elegant, and not like some washed-up rock star, but let’s not tell the demon that right now. 

Michael had passed a law in heaven for everyone to use human clothes them now. It was a matter of order and cohesion. He liked order. Of course, it was met with some concern. Angels had grown quite accustomed to wearing robes. It took some time to get everyone to adapt to changes. During the fifties, for example, you could be visited by two angels, one wearing a robe and one a black suit. It would have been quite disorienting if humans weren’t already too confused by angel apparitions to notice. The black suit was also cause of a lot of silly legends.

 “You didn’t lose him,” said Michael.  ”You  must have forgotten where you left him last time.”

“It’s God we’re talking about,” shouted Metatron. “Not some keys.  Of course  I haven’t ‘forgotten him somewhere’.We’ve lost him, Michael. He’s not here anymore.” Metatron put his index fingers on his temples.

“Maybe YOU’VE lost him. Have you committed any sin recently?”

“Michael!” he shouted, shocked at such an accusation.“Of course not. Besides, I’m God’s voice, how are we going to have his orders if doesn’t talk to me?”

Metatron was having an existential crisis. His whole persona was being voice of God. He had no idea how to manage the new silence. Well, God wasn’t always speaking to him; sometimes he’d go silent for hours and then shout things like “COCONUTS”. Metatron had no idea what he had meant by that but he was happy to shout it to others. It was their job to figure it out, not his. What was he now? Some kind of broken radio? Was he still even an angel? Why did God do this to him? Was he out favor? 

What if something actually happened to God himself? With that apocalypse fiasco, maybe.

“What if God is dead and we’ve killed him?”

“Oh,shut up!”

If Metatron had lost God it was going to be quite complicated to ask him questions. Not that he ever responded clearly. Most of the time it was like asking if you should wear a blue or a white shirt and having him respond “yes”.

Technically Metatron was Michael’s superior, but, without God’s voice, Michael found himself above Metatron on the management chart. He himself was rearranging the departments. He had done it with a lot of intelligence (as always, since it came from him, he thought). With a lot of moderation and humbleness he had put himself almost at the top of the pyramid. He had done it by pure logic, he really thought. 

Since Metatron seemed to be having some kind of moment right now, it was his duty to take charge of whatever was happening. He was the archangel Michael, it shouldn’t be that difficult for him to find where God was. And he had an idea.

Since the beginning of times, adversary camps, despite their willingness to kill each other, had kept some kind of contact. What was the point of putting your army on one hill if the adversary put his on another? It wasted everyone’s time. 

For hell and  heaven  it was a big red telephone.  Aziraphale’s  idea, but no one remembered that. Crowley had actually given the number to telemarketers once. The angel didn’t speak to him for two years after that and people in heaven were to terrified to answer it.

As someone took his call, Michael heard an awful scream. It really washell. 

“Hello? This is Heaven, Michael to be precise, who do I have the pleasure of speaking to?”

Hastur  shouldn’t have been near the telephone. He dreaded it because of the telemarketer Crowley had given the number to. The demon had said it was for them to learn from the bests. It had terrified hell even since. Humans were not only so much better than demons at this game, but they did it without evil plans. So good, in fact, that hell was now assured against tornadoes, volcanoes and loud neighbors.

After letting it ring for a minute, he had decided it was way more annoying than the soul he was torturing right now. He used one of his horrible appendices to pickup the handset. He was actually in his true form, a kind of eldritch absurdity.

“It’s Hastur, why are you calling?”

“Hello  Hastur , well, I know it’s quite silly but, we think we’ve lost God. Do you, by any chance, have him?”

Hastur  took some times to proceed all the information. He was not, by any means, an idiot, but he was not expecting that. Was it a trick? 

“What are you talking about?”

“God, have you seen him? Hemaybe near Satan, can you look into that for me?”

“Satan was wished away by the antichrist at the Armageddon’t , don’t you remember,  you  stupid angel?”

“Yeah, it’s true now you’ve said it, but then who’s ruling your place?”

“We don’t know, it’s quite messy right now. We’ve killed a lot of demons in the confusion, there’s blood everywhere. It’s disgusting cause since we’ve killed the cleaning department, no one’s taking care of it,” he said as he looked at his monstrouslower limbs, drenched in coagulated blood.

“Well it’s hell after all, ha-ha. I’m going to search for him, don’t forget to call me if you have any info. And don’t worry, I’m sure we didn’t lose him. Must just have gone for a walk, really. It’s Metatron, you know, he must have stepped on some internal button.”

Hastur  made an annoyed face, which was a pretty impressive thing to do for an unshaped monstrosity. Then something popped into his mind.

“Wait, if you’re not sure you’ve lost him, does that mean that he’s not constantly in heaven with you?”

“Yes, he is, as he is everywhere. But he’s not therethere , you know.”

“ So  who’s ruling?”

“Well, me obviously.  So  I am hanging up  right now, bye bye .”

At that moment a minor angel enterer the phone office.

 “You were using the phone?”

“The phone?!” Michael shouted in surprise. He didn’t wantthe news to spread right now.

“It’s hell on the line, isn’t it?”

“Yes. We... called because we’ve lost Go-”he took a pause, “-dot. Godot, we’ve lost him.”

“Never heard of him and never seen him.”

“No one has. Why are you here?”

“You remember you asked me to keep an eye on  Aziraphale ?”

He hadindeed, but he didn’t remember. The defrocked angel was the last of his worries right now.

“Well, it’s pretty embarrassing, but I thought you would want to  know .  He…you know he is friends with the demon Crowley?”

Michael  nodded,  he knew that  snakish  being. Quite ugly if you asked him, with his yellow eyes and his serpentine walk. Beauty was straight, pure, radiant like sunshine. Like him.

“I’m sorry but... they had- they have- they have gone native with each other.”

Michael scoffed. It was low, even for  Aziraphale . An angel shouldn’t have this kind of impulse. He himself, of course, had once felt desire, but he was the archangel Michael so he didn’t take it as a sin. He was superior to that. He had presented himself to the object of his affection, but it was to be nice to the girl, so she could admire him. And he never acted on it. Not in this way.

The small angel placed some pictures on the desk. You could clearly see them, in a garden, holding each other hands lovingly like some Babylonian whores. Michael averted his eyes, trying to escape such horror, when they were caught by another being. One dressed in black, with a beard and a hat. He had never seen him but he immediately knew. It was a feeling and an evidence.

He told the Angel to leave and turned to Metatron, who was still in a deep existential crisis.

“I should stop it all and becomes an apparition on some mountain to mess with humans and say some useless nonsense like ‘love each other’...”

“Metatron, I’ve found God, I know where he is!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes Ive made an erection joke with angels wings. I regret nothing. Also the portrayal of Michael by Hamm was so good I had to introduce him in the story


End file.
